Thursday, May 14, 2015

In my previous post, I detailed the sordid story by which the Episcopal Church (USA) has gotten into the debt collection business. Refugees designated to migrate to the United States are advanced travel money by an arm of the U.S. State Department. They land here, and are placed in the hands of (among other agencies) Episcopal Migration Ministries (EMM), which helps them relocate into specific communities, find jobs, and settle in. Then EMM sees that they repay their travel advances to the Government, and pockets one-quarter of its debt collection proceeds for its trouble.

It's a nifty racket, and ensures that annually over $300,000 comes into the Episcopal Church's coffers, to help with its bottom line. Meanwhile, the U.S. Government reimburses EMM for all of its other refugee relocation expenses, to the tune of some $14 million annually.

Now thanks to our good friend and frequent commenter El Gringo Viejo, your Curmudgeon has been pointed to this illuminating video message, which tells "the rest of the story," so to speak. It turns out that a good portion of the refugees EMM is assisting are not just any refugees, but are Muslims from some of the countries to which America has sent troops, bombs or both: Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq and (soon) Syria. Listen to Ann Corcoran as she explains what she discovered:

So let us draw the big picture: civil war breaks out in Muslim countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria; the United States intervenes militarily; havoc and destruction generate innumerable refugees, most of whom (but by no means all) are Sunni or Shiite Muslims; well-meaning Christians and liberals in the United States want to resettle them in our country, and so partner with the U.S. Government in bringing them here.

The only criterion for their migration to the United States appears to be that they cannot remain in their own war-torn country -- either because it does not want them, or because the situation is so unstable that no one can vouch for their safety or protection.

[UPDATE 05/15/2015: The one criterion of the State Department for refusing to include them in the refugee program is if they happen to be Christians:

Also inappropriate, it seems, is the resettling of the most vulnerable Assyrian Christians in the United States. Donors in the private sector have offered complete funding for the airfare and the resettlement in the United States of these Iraqi Christians that are sleeping in public buildings, on school floors, or worse. But the State Department – while admitting 4,425 Somalis to the United States in just the first six months of FY2015, and possibly even accepting members of ISIS through the Syrian and Iraqi refugee program, all paid for by tax dollars, told Dobbs that they “would not support a special category to bring Assyrian Christians into the United States.”

The United States government has made it clear that there is no way that Christians will be supported because of their religious affiliation, even though it is exactly that – their religious affiliation – that makes them candidates for asylum based on a credible fear of persecution from ISIS. The State Department, the wider administration, some in Congress and much of the media and other liberal elites insist that Christians cannot be given preferential treatment. Even within the churches, some Christians are so afraid of appearing to give preferential treatment to their fellow Christians that they are reluctant to plead the case of their Iraqi and Syrian brothers and sisters.

So now we have evidence that the "inclusive" liberals at 815 Second Avenue will not extend their sympathy to brother Christians, but only to Muslims and terrorists -- because the Government will not fund the rescuing of Christians.]

But those same well-meaning Christians and liberals, who elected a President to bring the troops home before the invaded countries were stable, also did so on their strongly held belief that the people of those countries could never become a democracy, even with our aid and support. One has to ask: what change in character justifies those now assisting the Muslim refugees in thinking that once brought here, they will fit in to our democracy? And would be preferable to, say, Assyrian Christians?

The communities to which the refugees are relocated have little or nothing to say about the process. Is it any surprise that a good number of the Muslim immigrants remain in enclaves of their own, and assimilate only to the degree necessary to qualify for jobs and welfare? And is it any surprise that some of them might harbor little good will for the country whose intervention they see as having uprooted them in the first place, and nurture the seeds for domestic terrorism?

It is not that Christians do not owe others a duty to provide refuge, assistance and support -- they do. But who is monitoring the overall process, and its effects upon our country? The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees? The State Department? The various liberal Church groups who use Government funds to help balance their books, and who leave the refugees to their own devices after they have been handsomely paid to settle them here? Give me a break. (Again, if there is any ongoing support of the displaced persons, it comes from local churches in the community, and not from the big denominations -- they do only that for which the Government reimburses them.)

It is the little people, like Ann Corcoran above, who have the most concern for the integrity of their towns and communities that are impacted most severely by these unsupervised migration activities. Her blog, Refugee Resettlement Watch, is the place to get the most detailed and up-to-date information about what is going on. The stories there are all well-documented, and some are eye-popping (be sure to take note of this disclaimer). A good place to start is this Resettlement Fact Sheet. You would do well to keep yourself informed.

10 comments:

On the other hand, we could view this not as a huge threat but as an opportunity. The fields for harvesting are coming to our neighborhoods. We no longer must travel across continents and oceans to reach them. Of course, it can be difficult to gain their trust, but what might some genuine expressions of love and care do?

Does our government forbid the coming of the Christians ?Or, do the churches request non-Christians ?It is as difficult to know the policies of churche leadership as to know what government policies are.I pay as much or more attention to both as anyone I know (and younger generations seem to pay much less) .I don't know if I am wiser, or paranoid, but it does seem to me that this great country is being destructed by design.Lord, help us.

The up-date added by our Vicar to his latest posting refers to what is possibly the most depressing grain of sand upon a huge beach of sedition, degeneracy, and degradation against the American Republic that has yet been committed. The complicity of the secular humanist, anti-theistic ogres who have inserted themselves into the Orthodox and mainline denominations of the Judaic and Christian Churches must be terribly sad, envious, vicious, and finally self-hating people. And they shall call evil good, and hideousness beauty, and it will not restore them. Can one imagine taking pride in painting a sign, hanging it at the door, and standing back to admire the message, "No Christians Admitted".

The weekend WSJ has a long article about the plight of Christians in MiddleEast. It ends saying we have three choices: we can help the minorities there "fort up" as the Isralies, Kurds and Maronites have done. We can help them to escape...find new homes and start new lives. Or we can do what history suggests, alas, as our most probable course: We can wring our hands and weep piously as the ancient communities in Syria and Iraq are murdered, raped and starved into oblivion, one by one.

You are a wise woman, Miss Maxine. It is a region made famous by wanton raping, pillaging, and murder by sweeping armies of deranged maniacs. The excesses of the Christian Crusader armies are well over-documented....sometimes even accurately. But, by a 20 - 1 ratio, the Crusaders, whose main objective was to keep pathways open to the pilgrims making their ways to the Holy Sites, were outdistanced by the Islamic armies who even killed any Ishmaelite who extended the hospitalities demanded by the Koran to the entering pilgrims.

The Kurds, save for the Texians, are probably the most pro-American foreigners left to the Potomac Palefaces and only private support is found for them. As do all progressives, Obama and his grubworm-gang seem to be absolutely, dirvishly, committed to the elimination of anything that is not approved by the Muslim Brotherhood in the middle-eastern theatre. The Kurds are the equivalent to the Mexican/Spanish defenders of the Alamo....and people who deserve special consideration....like lots of Filipinos and Viet Namese who held in with the Gringos during the Cold and Warm Wars.

They are our people. One wonders if the Bishopress and her minions within the Episcopal Jeremiah Wright Study Society for Social Justice ever think of the Kurdish babies...and the innocent Muslims and the Egyptians who have regularly treat Hebrew and Christian tourists fairly to very well....etc.etc.etc. I tire of lamenting the points well made by Maxine Schell, because I have no control over the truth she expresses. Saint Mary give me strength to further the efforts of Maxine and the contributors to Mr. Haley's column, and those who are concerned with the true plight of sincere people.El Gringo Viejo

There are many issues at play here, but I don't think that you should discredit the work of the various resettlement agencies. They are doing a great work of mercy among a beleaguered population. You can surely find fault with our government and its policies, and it doesn’t seem right that the Episcopal Church balances its books with monies skimmed from EMM, but I know most church related resettlement agencies don’t operate that way. It might serve you well to talk to some of the other agencies and get a better picture of how resettlement works.

MJ, the problem is not so much with the resettlement agencies, who are, as you say, doing good work. The problem is much more with the bias in favor of Muslims, and the prejudice against Christians, which the current Administration has built into the program.

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